Template-Based Volume Viewing

Abstract

We present an efficient three-phase algorithm for volume viewing that is based on exploiting coherency between rays in parallel projection. The algorithm starts by building a ray-template and determining a special plane for projection - the base-plane. Parallel rays are cast into the volume from within the projected region of the volume on the base-plane, by repeating the sequence of steps specified in the ray-template. We carefully choose the type of line to be employed and the way the template is being placed on the base-plane in order to assure uniform sampling of the volume by the discrete rays. We conclude by describing an optimized software implementation of our algorithm and reporting its performance.